U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued a general notice announcing the two-year extension of the quota preprocessing program (QPP) test, in order to provide for the electronic processing of certain quota-class apparel merchandise prior to the arrival of the importing carrier, through December 31, 2008.
The National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America (NCBFAA) held its annual Government Affairs Conference on September 18-19, 2006 in Washington, D.C., during which officials from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), as well as staff members from Congress, spoke. Highlights of their remarks include the following:
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued an administrative message on the automation of the Bahrain Free Trade Agreement (BFTA) in the Automated Commercial System (ACS).
Broker Power is able to provide quota prices (generally twice a month) for a limited number of textile and apparel categories from the People's Republic of China (China) that are subject to "agreed quotas" and publicly traded. (These publicly traded quota prices have been provided by a Hong Kong quota broker.)
Shippers' NewsWire reports that U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Ralph Basham spoke at the National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America's (NCBFAA) Government Affairs Conference and emphasized that he understands the importance of international trade to the economic security of the country and pledged to get the manpower to improve the speed of shipments across the border. Basham also acknowledged that developing the multibillion-dollar Secure Border Initiative (SBI) on the Southwest border has been at the expense of import/export facilitation, cargo security, and other traditional activities. (American Shipper, dated 09/19/06, www.americanshipper.com)
(BP is reissuing its summary of this CBP guide, which appeared in the September 18, 2006 ITT, 06091805, in order to delete all of CBP's references to Truck AMS (Automated Manifest System), as AMS is under ACS, and CBP's E-Manifest: Truck, though also an automated system, is under ACE (the Automated Commercial Environment). Other conforming changes are also made to BP's summary.)
The International Trade Administration (ITA) frequently issues notices on antidumping (AD) and countervailing (CV) duty orders which Broker Power considers to be "minor" in importance as they concern actions that occur after an order is issued and neither announce nor cause any changes to an order's duty rates, scope, affected firms, or effective period. The ITA also issues other notices which Broker Power considers to be "minor" in importance.
(BP will be reissuing its summary of this CBP guide in order to delete all of CBP's references to Truck AMS (Automated Manifest System), as AMS is under ACS, and CBP's E-Manifest: Truck, though also an automated system, is under the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE). Other conforming changes will also made. The corrected summary is expected to appear in the September 19, 2006 issue of ITT.)
Customs may pursue multiple broker penalties that in total exceed $30,000. In U.S. v. UPS Customshouse Brokerage, Inc., dba UPS Supply Chain Solutions, Inc., the Court of International Trade (CIT) gave Chevron deference to U.S. Customs and Border Protection's interpretation of the statutory phrase "a monetary penalty not to exceed $30,000 in total for a violation or violations of" in 19 USC 1641(d)(2)(A).
During the August 3, 2006 meeting of the Departmental Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of Customs and Border Protection and Related Homeland Security Functions (COAC), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials discussed, among other things, the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT).